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August 03, 2012

Ombre Ruffle Dress

This dress was inspired by a dress from the Gymboree Sea Splash collection.

The original dress had striped made in three shades of blue. I used white and two shades of blue, mainly because that was what I already had on hand. I am trying to use up some of my stash. It's starting to get a little out of control.

Bella loves the Pinkalicious books. She, however, says she is "Blue-a-licious" when she wears blue because her favorite color is blue. This dress works perfectly.

Ready to make your own? You'll need fabric in three shades. I'm not sure how much I used, since I just used what I had, but I'm guessing you'll need about a yard and a half to two yards of white, and around a yard of the other two colors. I just used cotton broadcloth. If you want the dress to lay flatter, use something like a knit {although knits are expensive-you may just want to buy the dress instead!}.

Click below for the tutorial.

First start by cutting out the body of the dress. I used a dress as a template and cut it wider so it would gather more.

Here it is on the fold. Don't cut all the way up to the shoulder, because we will be adding a gathered "sleeve" later.

Cut your ruffles. I used strips about twice as long as the bodice. For a less full dress, cut the strips shorter. Remember to cut some for the back as well.

Hem the bottom of the bodice.

Hem all those ruffles along the bottom.

Gather the ruffles.

Lay them out along your bodice. Leave a space at the top for the sleeves.

Lay them out along the back, matching them up.

Use a zig zag stitch and stitch the ruffles to the dress.

Trim the ruffles as needed to match the bodice armhole.

Place the front and back together right sides together and stitch up the side seams.

Zig zag stitch along the armhole.

Fold the zig zagged edge under and stitch to finish the arm hole.

Cut two more strips of fabric. Sew them to make one long strip.

Hem the bottom, then sew the other ends together to make a long, circular piece.

Pin that piece to the top of the bodice. The ends of the circle should be longer than the bodice.

Baste the strip to the top of the bodice in the front and back.

Make a casing all the way around the strip big enough to fit at least a 1/4 inch elastic. You want elastic that will be strong enough to hold the weight of the dress without stretching too much.

Leave an opening and insert the elastic.

Gather the elastic to the length you want. Stitch the ends of the elastic together, then stitch the opening in the casing closed.

Now you have an Ombre Ruffle Dress {or in our case, a Blue-a-licious dress}!

The Fine Print

Please feel free to use any of my tutorials for personal or small-scale commercial use. If you are making something to sell, a link to my blog is appreciated. Please do not use any of my pictures to sell your items. You are welcome to link to this blog, but do not republish an entire post without permission. Under NO condition are you allowed to use pictures of my children's faces. I make no guarantees as to the accuracy or completeness of any information found on this blog or on sites linked to. I try to be accurate about the positives and negatives when I post pattern reviews. The exception is patterns I've tested. Since I don't usually sew a garment using the final version of the instructions before I share my project, my review of the instructions/sizing might not reflect the end product accurately, so I don't usually go into detail about the pros and cons.